Grace's Reviews > Reader, I Murdered Him

** spoiler alert ** Thank you NetGalley for this eARC. Although I hated it, so maybe not.

No. No. No. No. If you love Jane Eyre, do not read this book. I am flabbergasted at all the 5 stars reviews of this blasphemous trash.

Jane Eyre is one of my all-time favorite books so imagine my excitement when I saw a YA Jane Eyre spin-off. And it was about Adele becoming a vigilante against men who hurt women in Victorian London?! I was ecstatic.

I enjoyed the first third of the book that told the story of Adele’s early life and her perspective of the events of Jane Eyre. I appreciated that it addressed some of the issues of the original novel (mainly Rochester keeping his wife locked in the attack). But then she goes to London and the story starts to unravel (at least in my opinion). After her first accidental murder, I was hoping to see her really embrace her darkness (that she talked about quite a bit when recalling her childhood) and would go full Jack-the-Ripper-vengeance-queen on shitty men she stops from hurting women. Does that not sound like a better plot than whatever this drivel was? Instead, she becomes a petty thief…? And we’re supposed to think she’s a vigilante hero because she robs drunk men and pawns their shit? Even her romance with Nan felt underdeveloped, although props for bisexual rep in Victorian England.

But then. Then. We have her return to see her Papa on his deathbed and he’s an absolute disgusting creep?! We’re supposed to believe that (1) Jane Eyre would not see through Rochester’s facade if he was in fact a huge fucking pervert, but (2) that Rochester has been writing her love letters as his cousin and has been waiting until she was old enough to marry her?! And leave Jane and their children to go live in the Caribbean with his daughter-wife? What in the everloving hell were the author and publisher thinking? Why not just dig up Charlotte Brontë and spit on her corpse? I think we can all agree, in our 21st century wisdom, that Rochester was not the best man. But to take a character that said "I ask you to pass through life at my side--to be my second self, and best earthly companion” and turn him into this is unforgivable. No. No. No. No. I can safely say that I will never read anything written by this author again and will discourage everyone from picking up this garbage.

Also, I’m not being this harsh because I dislike retellings of classics. There are several that do a magnificent job of retelling the story in a new and more modern way, while still maintaining the original charm of beloved characters. Tirzah Price’s Jane Austen Murder Mystery series is a great example of this.